A 50,000-piece clothing order, unit price $2.15, totaling $107,500.
The current exchange rate is around 8.23 yuan, which converts to an order of approximately 884,700 RMB.
For foreign merchants, it's a trial, but for Tan Jincheng, it's a dream start.
"Pleasure working with you. We will arrange production as soon as possible and definitely won't delay the delivery date. Please rest assured, Mr. James."
The moment both parties officially signed the contract, Tan Jincheng smiled happily.
"Pleasure working with you, Tan; we will immediately arrange for the deposit to be transferred to your company's account."
The tall and muscular James also said with a smile, the young man who looked slender in front of him had truly surprised him.
At only 19 years old, he hadn't even attended university, but he could speak fluent English, making communication very smooth.
He was thick-skinned, but not annoying, and very polite.
James was impressed by the styles of several samples he held, but unfortunately, his company's scale was too small, and James couldn't trust them to handle large orders.
Therefore, James decided to place a small batch order first, to test Tan's capabilities.
However, James naturally wouldn't reveal these little thoughts directly.
$100,000 USD is just a drop in the bucket for a foreign trade merchant of James's scale; if Tan can deliver on time, with quality and quantity, James doesn't mind a future cooperation.
Nothing else, just because Tan Jincheng's quote was cheap enough; similar products of the same quality from other manufacturers were generally quoted at $2.50 USD or more.
Of course, this young man wasn't foolish; the initial cooperation quote could be cheaper, but the advance payment had to be increased from 30% to 40%.
A small batch order, with an additional $10,000 USD in advance payment, was acceptable to James.
In the foreign trade industry, there is a core principle for collecting deposits: both parties want to minimize their own risks, while also keeping the client within an acceptable range.
Generally speaking, for legitimate foreign trade companies, a 30% deposit and 70% final payment upon seeing a copy of the bill of lading is a basically safe and mutually acceptable payment method.
However, for actual orders, it will be analyzed according to specific circumstances, such as whether it's a new or old client, and the client's creditworthiness.
Secondly, there's the order amount, the risk factor of the client's region, and the product itself.
The product itself refers to the distinction between regular products, customized products, and mass-market versus niche.
However, for some high-risk regions, a 30% advance payment is definitely not enough, for example, Ah San.
Ah San's reputation in the foreign trade industry is notorious, with continuous tricky maneuvers, and many domestic foreign trade merchants have been scammed by them.
The specific operation is, for example, a certain Ah San client customizes a batch of goods from a domestic foreign trade merchant, such as furniture, clothing, etc.
These goods generally have an Ah San style that clients from other countries wouldn't appreciate.
Often, the value of these goods is considerable, and domestic merchants who haven't experienced it can't resist the temptation when seeing a large order, so they produce the goods.
Once the merchant produces the products all at once, the client chooses to abandon the goods directly, and then another Ah San client will come and choose to acquire them at a lower price.
At this point, the foreign trade merchant has no other choice but to sell them off at a low, loss-making price.
Therefore, when cooperating with foreign trade merchants with poor creditworthiness like Ah San, both the deposit and the payment for goods must be collected in full, otherwise, every deal will result in a loss.
However, Tan Jincheng didn't intend to develop clients like Ah San; there were quite a few Ah San clients at this exhibition, and they had also inquired with Tan Jincheng.
Although he had to deal with them superficially, he never thought of doing business with them, just quote high prices so they couldn't accept them.
Even Lei Bu Si couldn't handle that country, Tan Jincheng didn't think he had the ability to gain an advantage by dealing with this bunch of scammers.
Tan Jincheng and James's cooperation was a first-time collaboration, and given the small amount, James was able to accept an additional 10% deposit.
Over ten thousand US dollars was not even enough to cover James's travel expenses for this trip.
And for Tan Jincheng, although this extra 10% deposit was not enough to fully cover the costs, it would ultimately be safer.
If he could further compress costs, coupled with the export tax rebate policy, Tan Jincheng estimated that even if this order truly fell through, he wouldn't lose too much.
Finally securing the first order, Tan Jincheng could finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Counting it up, he had been in Yangcheng for a week, a week of spending like water, and finally had some harvest.
If he didn't get another order, he wouldn't be able to hold on much longer.
"Brothers and sisters, it's my treat today! I've signed an order, haha."
Tan Jincheng said happily before the exhibition hall closed for the day.
"Haha, little Tan, that's great! You've opened for business, faster than we expected."
"Not bad, not bad. Your first order in life, it's certainly worth celebrating, but you're not treating today. We, your brothers, will chip in to treat you. Order whatever you want."
"Exactly, you've been treating for several days, it's time for us sisters to show you something."
"That's right, Little Tan, order anything tonight."
After a few days of getting along, everyone had more or less signed some orders, and everyone had commissions to earn, so they were also happy to see Tan Jincheng secure an order.
Once people are not short on money, getting along naturally becomes more pleasant.
Finally, everyone unanimously decided that the six of them would chip in tonight to go eat barbecue together.
There's nothing a barbecue can't solve; if there is, then two barbecues!
Under the night sky, a group of people sat at a roadside stall, enjoying small barbecues.
Whether it was psychological or something else, Tan Jincheng always felt that these lamb skewers tasted better than those in later generations.
Back at the hotel, Tan Jincheng couldn't wait to call Zhang Xupeng, telling him to constantly monitor the company's bank account for the next two days, coordinate with finance, and immediately arrange production once the deposit was received.
Currently, there are 4,000 finished products of these two samples; only another 46,000 pieces need to be produced.
As for the defect rate issue, Tan Jincheng planned to push the burden onto the contract factory.
46,000 pieces, at the previous price, the total amount is around 400,000 yuan, which is a significant figure for the contract factory.
With sufficient advance payment, asking them to be responsible for the defect rate is not a problem.
The only requirement is that they must be produced with quality and quantity within the specified time, because there are various subsequent processes such as packaging.
"That's great, we've finally opened for business! I'll be monitoring the account these two days,"
Zhang Xupeng said excitedly.
Then he asked,
"So, can you come back? Then the two of us can keep an eye on things."
"Not going back yet. I'll see if I can get a few more orders. If I can get another one, that would be even better."
"Oh, right, transfer ten thousand of your money to me, just in case."
"No problem, I'll go to the bank to transfer it to you tomorrow."
If there's another decent order, then Jinpeng Trade will be able to ensure normal operations until the Canton Fair next spring.
(End of chapter)
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